SITREP #00012

SITUATION

The majority of the team is now prepping the Arma 3 Beta content in weekly iterations. Of course we do also have an Alpha to support, and things are looking good for a new large Alpha update tomorrow (*insert the usual catastrophe disclaimer here*). Seeing how last SPOTREP was mostly a hotfix, this one will have a long list of Development branch changes - including recent tweaks to lighting and audio. It's also possible it contains things that had not yet made it to Development branch. This is a full snapshot of the game, unlike Development branch, which only contains manual requests from any developer on the team.

Meanwhile on Development branch itself, you will start to see a small but cool content addition for the Alpha. We are going to be staging our "Sniper Package" there. It is to be included in the Alpha update after the one tomorrow. The package contains a sniper / spotter duo for BLUFOR and one for OPFOR. Both will have an improved ghillie suit and anti-materiel sniper rifle with standard optics. At their disposal as well is a portable rangefinder. We will not actually announce this addition widely until we release it into main branch, but we're sure you'll be able to find them in the editor sandbox - look for moving shrubbery!

INTELLIGENCE

Our trusty (Sandbox) Design Lead, Lukas Haladik, premiered a new series of 'Report In!' developer interviews. He talks about his career at Bohemia Interactive, the design of a sandbox experience, the editor and more.

Unlimited saves will be disabled for all difficulties except "Recruit". This means you'll have only one save slot per mission, which you cannot overwrite. It should motivate you not to be reckless and stimulate you to plan your every step. Scenario designers should take this into consideration and balance their scenarios appropriately; offering automatic checkpoints and tweaking enemy strength is a good place to start. We hope to expand upon this decision in a blog post at a later date.

OPERATIONS

LOGISTICS

Keep in mind the Arma 3 Alpha Lite will become unavailable after June 18. This means it will be disabled as Steam application and be removed from your libraries. Any unclaimed Lite access codes will be revoked. From that moment we will enter a phase during which you can only access Arma 3 by purchasing it. As with all of our previous games, we will definitely return to the free game space with a demo after full release.